I (M late 30s) and my wife (F late 30s) have a good relationship for the most part, but have a underlying issue with money. Almost 3 weeks ago our washing machine broke, and my wife suggested getting a new one on finance (£15 a month, nothing significant) for 3 years. My brother (plumber) had an old washing machine available from a house he recently bought, and was told it was working. I felt that it made sense to take the free washing machine to save money.
We decided to go with the free washing machine which my brother promised to drop round and install ASAP. Whilst we were both hopeful he would be quick, he is notoriously unreliable. As you may have guessed he took longer than anticipated (he’s very busy with work) and my wife waited in and was annoyed with him. My car wasn’t big enough to collect the machine, so we had to wait for him. He lives about 30 mins away.
My brother came round today, and took the old one away but unfortunately the new one does not work. The machine is a bit of a lost cause due to lots of black mould so we will buy one now.
My wife is angry because I promised her the machine would work, and how she’s waited in a few times. I agreed with her on these points, but she’s fuming because we could have a new machine by now. I agreed, but at the same time my brother was trying to do us a favour even if it’s taken him a few weeks. My brother also fixed our old boiler (25 years old) 7 times over the years for FREE. He put in a combi boiler earlier this year as we were fed up. I said to my wife that we know how frustrating he can be, but at the same time he has helped us so many times with the boiler, with work, with money, and been we are all really good friends. Whilst we had no washing machine my wife’s parents have kindly done several loads for us (and seemed happy to do so).
During the argument tonight I let out some frustration that I have with our money situation. I said if she wants a machine badly then pay halves with me (she wasn’t keen). Previously I had to put £1000 of my own money into the joint account to pay bills, and personally leant her £150 or so (both around a year ago). I said I was trying to save us money due to previous money issues, and she keeps blowing her money and hasn’t paid me back. My wife was angry because I brought this up around a month ago, and she offered to pay some back but I declined as we were paying for a holiday, so we had less money that month. I didn’t want her to have very little for the month.
Our finances are split 50/50 after bills so we both get the same amount each month, I am the higher earner out of the 2 of us. I am also changing jobs soon to one I enjoy more, but it will be less money for a year whilst I train up. This is another reason why I didn’t want to do finance if I could avoid it, it’s only a small amount but our overall money will be much less for a while so every penny counts.